IANS: UN agencies in Afghanistan Thursday called for protecting Afghan girls against child marriage, even as the tradition remains rampant in the country. More than 46 percent of Afghan women are married before age 18, and over 15 percent before age 15, Xinhua quoted the “Afghanistan Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey 2010-11″ as saying. Full news...

The Huffington Post: In the last month, the United States hit three milestones in the war in Afghanistan. In late September, the 33,000 additional soldiers that President Obama ordered to Afghanistan in late 2009 came home, leaving 68,000 troops in the country as part of the 108,000-person NATO force. Also last month, the number of U.S. soldiers killed reached 2,000. And this past Sunday marked the 11th anniversary of the longest war in American history. Full news...

PAN: Hundreds of residents of southeastern Paktika province on Wednesday staged a protest against nighttime raids by the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). The protestors marched through parts of Sharan, the provincial capital, chanting slogans against ISAF and US troops and asking them not to bother ordinary people in the raids. Full news...

TOLOnews.com: Afghan senators on Tuesday called for Parliament to take a final decision regarding the name change of Education University to Martyr of Peace Burhanuddin Rabbani University. Student protests over the name change, which have continued for more than two weeks, turned violent yesterday with up to 20 students arrested for blocking the entrance to the university and vandalising the name plaque. Full news...

DTNB: Protesters marched Saturday morning in an effort to shut down the Hollywood Army Recruitment Center on the 11-year anniversary of the war and occupation of Afghanistan. The recruitment center was closed for the day, with police guarding the front entrances from the crowd of more than 100 people. Full news...

Reuters: The Afghanistan war is getting worse for civilians, with armed groups on the rise across the country and access to healthcare deteriorating as foreign combat troops depart, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Monday. Outgoing head of the ICRC delegation in Afghanistan, Reto Stocker, a seven-year veteran of Afghan aid efforts, said as the NATO-led war against the Taliban dragged into a twelfth year... Full news...

Killid Group: Underage marriages may be behind the high mortality figures for women. An overwhelming number of girls are deprived of the right to education and a childhood. Sadia Fayeq Ayubi, head of the reproductive health department in the Ministry of Public Health says early marriage is illegal but girls are married off between 13 and 17 years, and pregnant between 17 and 19 years. Full news...

PAN: Residents of Nad Ali district on Saturday staged a demonstration against NATO-led troops in Lashkargah, the capital of southern Helmand province. Around 100 protestors, including elderly men, accused International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) soldiers of killing innocent civilians during operations in the district, whose security recently transitioned to Afghan forces. Full news...

IWPR: When families in some parts of Afghanistan fall out over serious matters, one way of resolving matters is for the offending party to hand over a woman to the other side. Known as “baad”, the custom involves an arranged marriage between the woman and someone from the injured family. It is seen as a way of avoiding an escalating blood feud which could cost many lives on both side. Full news...

IRIN: How do you tackle widespread malnutrition in a poor, corrupt country at war? Despite billions of dollars in aid over the last decade, Afghanistan’s malnutrition rates have soared, now well-past emergency thresholds, with one-fifth of children malnourished overall; one-third of children acutely malnourished in some conflict areas; and 60 percent of children under five stunted... Full news...

GlobalPost: The first explosion came early in the morning while Yousef, a local army medic, was still in bed. Before he had time to understand what had happened, the second blast ripped through the US-Afghan base, sending him crashing to the ground. At least 12 people were killed and dozens more wounded in the twin suicide attack, which struck on Sept. 1. Bodies lay scattered in the dirt — some trapped under debris. Full news...

RFE/RL: Public tributes to Afghanistan’s fallen national heroes are readily apparent to any traveler driving through the country’s capital, where scores of prominent streets, squares, and schools have been renamed to honor the dead. But deciding just who is a national hero and who is a national villain has proved highly contentious, a byproduct of conflict among rival and even warring ethnic, religious, and political groups. Full news...

Killid Group (Translated by RAWA): Violence against women has always existed but is now appearing in new methods. Amputation of ears, nose and fingers are the new methods of violence emerging nowadays. In the most recent such incident, security forces brought a dead woman to Herat Regional Hospital, whose ear and nose had been cut off. Full news...

Der Spiegel: Afghan President Hamid Karzai likes to tell the West what it wants to hear. “We will fight corruption with great determination,” he says. Or: “We will relentlessly strive for good governance.” Such messages are well received in the West, because they correspond with the rosy picture that Western officials like to relay to the public themselves. Full news...

Reuters: Muzhgan Masoomi’s attacker stabbed her 14 times with a thick blade used to slaughter animals, tearing wide gashes in her flesh before leaving the government worker for dead on the outskirts of the Afghan capital. With a severe limp and no control over her bladder – caused by the blade scraping her spinal cord - the 22-year-old can no longer work at the Ministry of Public Works, where she was a financial assistant before the assault. Full news...

GlobalPost.com: Mawlawi Ataullah Faizani took time out from teaching Islamic studies at a girls’ school in Kabul to explain why Afghans have a duty to resist the occupation of their country. He quoted sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, spoke of foreign troops humiliating civilians, and ridiculed the corruption that runs through the heart of the government. Full news...

PAN: Hundreds of students on Saturday staged another protest against naming the Kabul University of Education and Training after former president Prof. Burhanuddin Rabbani and blocked the entrance to the parliament building. On Cabinet’s recommendation, President Hamid Karzai issued a decree last week, renaming the university after Rabbani... Full news...

IWPR: The mayor of Mazar-e Sharif was outlining how the Afghan authorities were tackling corruption, when an elderly man stopped him in his tracks. “If you want to fight corruption, the greatest corruption exists in your own administration, the municipality,” said the man, Nek Baba. “You should reform yourself first.” Full news...

Deutsche Welle: The lashing of a teenage girl in Afghanistan for having an “illegal relationship” has caused an uproar inside and outside the country. Experts fear a “Talibanization” of the Afghan justice system. On September 16, three mullahs in the southern Afghan province of Ghazni sentenced 16-year-old Sabera to 100 lashes for having an “illegal relationship” with a boy. Full news...

PAN: A lawmaker and tribal elders on Thursday claimed Pakistani army had threatened residents in various villages of the Goshta district in eastern Nangarhar province to vacate their homes and move elsewhere. The claim was echoed during a huge gathering of Momand tribesmen in the district. Wolesi Jirga member Faridon Momand told the gathering that Pakistani army officials had warned residents of Mamakhel, Khugyani and Dawarkhel villages to leave the area. Full news...

IWPR: Local officials in Afghanistan’s Laghman province are taking tens of thousands of US dollars a month in fees and taxes from drivers using the Kabul-Jalalabad highway, and the way the money is collected indicates that it is being pocketed. An investigation by IWPR contributors over a three-month period reveals that various forms of irregular fees are being imposed on the road. Full news...

Al Jazeera: In what had become a daily ritual, Anisa Shahghasi said goodbye to her son, Nawab, with prayers on her lips and a quick wave of her hand. The world outside their cramped Kabul home was fraught with dangers. And like every other mother in the Afghan capital - which still witnesses regular bombings and deadly attacks - Anisa wished for her son’s safe return. Full news...

TOLOnews.com: The police commander of western Badghis province Abdul Jabar Salah was accused in the Afghan parliament session on Saturday of raping three policewomen under his command. Badghis MP Mohammad Musa Janab made the accussation in parliament, saying that President Hamid Karzai had been informed. Full news...

PAN: Hundreds of students at the Kabul Education University on Saturday protested a presidential announcement renaming the institute after a slain politician and former president, Prof. Burhanuddin Rabbani. Rabbani, the Jamiat-i-Islami Afghanistan party leader, was assassinated along with three other members of the high peace council in a suicide attack Full news...

PAN: The NATO-led International Security Force (ISAF) on Saturday said that several insurgents, including a Taliban leader believed to be behind the Nov. 10, 2011 suicide attack, were arrested during a joint operation in southeastern Paktia province, contradicting claims that a civilian had been killed and others arrested. Full news...

The Huffington Post: With over one million Afghanis addicted to drugs, Afghanistan has lagged far behind when it comes to curtailing its bourgeoning drug production and trafficking. In the video above, CNN reporter Lindsey Tugman sheds light on the exacerbating drug crisis in Afghanistan and the lack of collective action in the international community to provide a solution. Full news...

GlobalPost: Nearly 46 percent of women between ages 20 and 24 gave birth to a child before their eighteenth birthday in the Western regions of Afghanistan, and one in four women in the country overall delivered a live birth before reaching adulthood, says a new report backed by UNICEF. “Alarmingly, 2 percent have had a live birth before the age of 15,” says the report. Full news...

Khaama Press: Chief of the parliamentarian commission for human rights, civil society and women’s affairs Fawzia Koufi expressed concerns regarding the Afghan women detainees where majority of them have been arrested for escaping their homes. Fawzia Koufi said more than 70% of the Afghan women have been jailed for escaping their homes despite this is not crime in Afghan law. Full news...

VOA: Afghan officials say NATO coalition forces have killed eight women and girls in an airstrike in a remote district of the country. The deaths come after three “insider” attacks in as many days by Afghan forces against international soldiers killed eight troops, including four Americans. Sunday’s airstrike came shortly before dawn, in Laghman province's Alingar district, east of Kabul. Full news...

Deutsche Welle Dari (Translated by RAWA): A 16-year old girl was lashed by local mullahs (clerics) in Jaghori district of Ghazni province on charges of what have been called illicit relations. This was carried out in the absence of legal and humanitarian institutions. Zafar Sharif, district chief of Jaghori said that details of the case are still not clear and the investigation is going on. Full news...

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